San Francisco Classical Voice

SYMPHONY REVIEW Something Old,
Something New

January 22-23, 2002

By Heuwell Tircuit

As unlikely a program as can be imagined, played in a new venue before a packed audience, highlighted last week's Berkeley Symphony concerts under Kent Nagano. The conductor pulled off another of his slightly nutty successes in Roda Theater with almost casual aplomb by being as demanding of his audience as of his players. The success of the evening can only partially be explained by Nagano including three important soloists. Violinist Stuart Canin and pianist Markus Pawlik were featured in Berg's Chamber Concerto before percussionist Ward Spangler premiered the late David Sheinfeld's Different Worlds of Sound. All this was preluded by Nagano, who conjured a refined, elegant performance of Schubert's Fifth Symphony.

So much for the orchestral performances. But hold on — there was also a guest appearance of the Sonos Handbell Ensemble under director James Meredith, playing Karen Lakey Buckwalter's Nocturne in A minor. Although the need for this seems obscure, it at least supported their outstanding artistry for an audience that might not otherwise encounter them in performance.

Canin, of course, is well known as a master fiddler. Even so, his playing during the Berg left one a bit awed. Technical matters can be taken for granted when he's on stage. No problems there. What impressed even more was Canin's uncanny feeling for an idealized Berg style. His playing was lush but never overly perfumed, classical yet sophisticatedly flexible. What one heard had a little Mozartian touch to it. I can't say I've ever heard the Kammerkonzert's violin part so convincingly set forth.

Solid keyboard playing

Pawlik, a major rising star of German pianism, also played beautifully, with appropriate intensity of tone. It's what a teacher used to call 'playing to the bottom of the keys.' Pawlik's solo passages, however, tended toward more-overtly Romantic gestures. We got The Big Sound, mercifully free of showoff gesturing.

Sheinfeld (1906-2001) wrote Different Worlds of Sound for Spangler, who also served as advisor during the work's gestation. What emerged was a kind of free concerto in four sections, but laid out more like a sinfonia concertante. In other words, it is really an orchestral work but with a prominent solo percussionist as an equal partner.

Sheinfeld, a pupil of Respighi in the 1930s, moved well beyond that influence as he earned his daily bowl of rice in the first violin section of the San Francisco Symphony. The one element of his career obviously helped the other. As an active performing musician he was able to keep up with current musical vocabulary as the century progressed. Even in his 90's, Sheinfeld never fell back into comfortable routine. So the musical language sounded right up there with Berio, light hints of Ligeti and Lutoslawski, especially in the latter's fondness for twittering textures.

Narrow expressive range

Spangler has long been a major figure of the local scene, from Bay to Shining Sea. He plays or has played with just about every orchestra from Santa Rosa to Cabrillo with distinction. The one problem with the performance, and indeed the piece itself, was the lack of sufficient contrast. Everything was loud or louder, a standard cross borne by percussion music. No one instrument was played for more than a few seconds, so that Spangler's constant movement was never given a chance to focus. One wished in vain for a bit of deviance from the onslaught within the work's 25 minutes.

As the obverse of that percussion problem, the genteel bell ringing of Sonos Handbellers came across as pure dulcet magic. Much the same applies to the balletic aspect of their performance. Never mind the music, the visual side was mesmerizing. Here's this phalanx of musicians strung across the stage, with glittering handbells on a felt-covered table. Playing from memory, they seemed in some sort of spiritual trance, slowly but precisely performing an ethereal quest. Buckwalter's Nocturne was short and harmlessly pretty in a sort of late-19th-century manner. The performance was All.

Roda Theater hall is relatively shallow, which has the advantage of intimacy. Even in the front row of the balcony, one had the feeling of being with the performers rather than merely watching them at work. On the other hand, being close has its disadvantages.

Psychoacoustic intrusions

Musicians rarely hear what they're playing in quite the way audiences do. A natural coarseness of the sound of playing comes across to the performer. In the case of a string instrument, for example, the musician is more aware of the percussive element of hair scraping on "gut". Space spares audiences from most of that In Roda but the naturally-dry acoustics tend to present some of the unpleasant elements of music-making.

Efforts have been made to gussy up the Roda's sonics by electronic means, which may have helped, but not a lot. The sonics were not all that unpleasant, but balances were distorted. Anything near the apron projected strongly, at the expense of those seated further back at stage center. In the Schubert, for instance, the violins rather overpowered everything else, as did the piano during the Berg.

Electronic enhancement is foredoomed. It can make things better, but it will never get them right. The mass of tiny details defeats enhancements. You don't hear the enhancement so much as what's missing. The Berkeley Symphony would do well to simply move back to Hertz Hall on the UC campus, which has the finest acoustics in the East Bay and is probably the best looking.

(Heuwell Tircuit, composer, performer and writer, was chief writer for Gramophone Japan and for 21 years a music reviewer for the SF Chronicle, previously for the Chicago American and Asahi Evening News.)